A portion of the disclosure of this patent document, including each of the drawings, contains material which is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has no objection to the facsimile reproduction by any one of the patent disclosures, as it appears in the Patent and Trademark Office patent files or records, but otherwise reserves all copyright rights whatsoever.
1. Field of the Invention
Detailed herein are systems and methods of automatically customizing a viewer-selected video responsive to the application of the viewer""s video content preferences to a segment map of the video.
In the delivery of a viewer-selected video advertisement, a version of the advertisement is transmitted that is responsive to the viewer""s preferences for a level of detail and explicitness in a range of content categories. The viewer is compensated for the viewing of the video advertisement.
In instances where the viewing of the video is interrupted by a communication, delivery of the video is automatically placed on hold (paused) in response to the viewer accepting the communication. Upon completion of the communication, the delivery of the video is automatically restarted at the point placed on hold, at some pre-defined amount of time prior to the placing on hold of the video, or at a suitable prior point in the video.
2. Background of the Invention
As the delivery of video programs moves from a broadcast architecture to a pointcast architecture, the digital superhighway promises the delivery of a variety of interactive video services, including interactive video games and information services.
However, with respect to non-interactive entertainment programming, such as motion pictures, video programming concepts remain largely rooted in the primitive traditional linear architectures of celluloid films. Proposed movies-on-demand services, while utilizing a pointcast architecture, largely reflect the broadcast tradition in terms of the video provided.
Traditionally, the strategy of video advertisement has been to utilize programming interruptions to deliver advertisement which a viewer seldom has a desire to receive. Advertising concepts have yet to suggest the realization of the potential that video server based pointcast delivery systems offer in terms of the delivery of a viewer requested automatically customized video advertisement, and compensating the viewer for the apparent viewing of the advertisement.
Similarly, the delivery of communication and video services have traditionally been separate and distinct, the prior art as yet to address the issues relating to the integration of the viewing of a video program with the receipt of a communication.
The patents to Von Kohorn, U.S. Pat. No. 4,520,404; Chard, U.S. Pat. No. 4,605,964; Kiesel, U.S. Pat. No. 4,729,044; Olivo Jr., U.S. Pat. No. 4,888,796; Vogel, U.S. Pat. No. 4,930,158; Vogel, U.S. Pat. No. 4,930,160; Boyd et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,023,727; and Palmer, U.S. Pat. No. 5,195,135; the teachings of which are incorporated by reference herein, detail a variety of video editing systems. However, none of these references describe a system in which the contents of a video program are automatically customized in response to a viewer""s video content preferences.
In view of the foregoing shortcomings of the prior art, it is evident that the opportunity presents itself for a new class of video services that fully realize the potential of the random access capabilities of video servers and the pointcast architecture of video-on-demand services.
Accordingly, it is an object of the systems and methods herein disclosed to deliver to a viewer an automatically customized version of a single edition of the viewer-selected video responsive to the viewer""s content preferences for the level of detail and explicitness in a range of content categories.
It is also an object to compensate the viewer for the viewing of a viewer selected video advertisement.
It is also an object to integrate the delivery of video and communication services.
Briefly these and other objects are accomplished by video production and editing systems and methods that assign segments of a video appropriate content descriptors. A segment""s definition comprises a descriptor that provides specific and detailed information as to each segment""s subject matter, level of detail, and form of expression. A segment""s definition further comprises a first and last frame identifier, and beginning frame identifier of the next logical segments. The segments definitions are organized into a video map.
Thus a variable content video comprises not only video and audio information, but also a video segment map that identifies the location and content of each of the video""s segments as well as their potential order.
A content-on-demand video is a variable content video further distinguished from its linear video predecessors in that it also comprises parallel and transitional segments that enhance the seamless continuity among non-sequential segments and provide a greater range of levels of detail and explicitness.
Random access and pointcast technologies are enhanced to provide each viewer the opportunity to preestablish both any number of general content preferences, and video/event specific content preferences, identifying the viewers"" preferences in each of a number of content categories.
The playing of a content-on-demand video does not require that the viewer preview the contents of the segments of the video or that the viewer have knowledge of the contents of segments of the video. The viewing of a content-on-demand video does not require viewer intervention during the viewing of the video. A video system as per the present invention automatically customizes, responsive to a viewer""s video content preferences, a video selected by a viewer, and transmits the customized version of the video as a continuous video.
Once a video server or Video CD has learned a viewer""s content preferences it will thereafter automatically apply those content preferences to the video map of any content-on-demand video the viewer has selected. By applying a viewer""s video content preferences as they relate to the video segment map of the selected video, the random access device gains the information to automatically exclude segments of the video containing material which the viewer does not wish to view, and to transmit as a logical seamless and continuous video, only those sequential or non-sequential segments of the video whose content and form of expression are consistent with the viewer""s video content preferences. The resulting version of a video that is provided each viewer automatically provides scenes of the video at the desired level of explicitness and detail that the viewer desires.
If a viewer prefers, for example, not to view bloodshed in a motion picture, the video content preferences would indicate this preference. Thus, regardless of the source of the video, the category of the video, the particular video selection method utilized, or the particular video selected, the video system of the present invention will automatically omit transmitting any segment that included bloodshed.
In contrast to interactive motion pictures, and full motion video games, in a content-on-demand video it is primarily the form of expression that is the object of alternate frame sequences, rather than the story-line. In a content-on-demand video, each of the significant scenes and actions can be implicitly expressed, as found for example in a xe2x80x9cPGxe2x80x9d rated film, explicitly expressed, as found for example in an xe2x80x9cRxe2x80x9d rated film, and graphically expressed, as found for example in an xe2x80x9cNC-17xe2x80x9d rated film.
Traditionally, each edition of a film or program, such as a theatrical release, director""s cut, European version, has been separately packaged as a unique linear sequence of frames. A content-on-demand video combines in a single nonlinear package all the segments of each of the potential versions of a program.
In a conventional video-on-demand system, every viewer that selects a given program is provided the same version of that program. In a content-on-demand system each viewer is automatically provided a customized version of that program. In a video-on-demand system, if 1,000 viewers select the same program, each viewer will be provided exactly the same program. In a content-on-demand system, if the same 1,000 viewers select the same program, each viewer could be provided a unique version of that program.
Where a single video contains segments in at least twenty different content categories (e.g. bloodshed, violence, nudity, etc.) and can be edited at four levels of explicitness (e.g. none, implied, explicit, and graphic), a content-on-demand system can automatically extract over one trillion unique versions from that single video.
In a content-on-demand video the artist and producer are challenged to create greater variety in the form of expression. Utilizing parallel, transitional, and overlapping segments, a content-on-demand video provides viewing at that level of expression, content, detail, and length, that is consistent with a variety of viewer preferences.
Content-on-demand encourages and challenges directors to exercise fully their creativity, without abdicating to the limitations imposed by the film rating systems, narrowly defined marketing objectives, and artificial time constraints. At the same time, content-on-demand is superior to any technology in automatically ensuring that viewers are not exposed to material they would have preferred not to view, and ensuring that children are not exposed to unsuitable viewing material. Freedom of expression need not be incompatible with freedom from expression.
Censoring technology, such as the xe2x80x9cviolence chipxe2x80x9d that would scramble reception of the incoming picture, making it possible, for example, for parents to block reception of entire programs xe2x80x9cdeemedxe2x80x9d violent is inferior in every respect to the content-on-demand architecture disclosed herein. The violence chip and similar technologies result from a broadcast and linear film architecture rather than a pointcast and variable content architecture. Broadcast technologies are conceptually obsolete in the pointcast era of video-on-demand technology.
Content-on-demand permits a parent or viewer to determine what is objectionable. Only objectionable segments are excluded and replaced with suitable parallel segments. The resulting video retains a seamless continuity.
While content-on-demand nonlinear architecture shares elements with interactive programming and facilitates the inclusion of the sophisticated interactive capabilities disclosed herein, content-on-demand, however, is uniquely distinguished from interactive programming by its xe2x80x9cautoactivexe2x80x9d design. Content-on-demand""s autoactivity provides viewers precisely what they want, in the form that they want it, at the time they want it, without requiring that viewers interact with the video.
Content-on-demand abandons the concept of a video as a prepackaged viewing unit, and adopts the concept of a video as an assortment of individually selectable segments and scenes. Content-on-demand videos are in combination a powerful and rich xe2x80x9cvideobasexe2x80x9d that makes possible a variety of innovative video services that educate, instruct, inform, and entertain.
The content-on-demand architecture applies as well to movies, news, sports, educational programming, and to advertisements. The advertisement embodiments of the teachings of content-on-demand results in advertisements, commercials, and informationals of greater value to the viewer and to the sponsor.
Specifically, with request to advertisements, the thesis is herein advanced that a viewer will request a specific advertisement which is informational in nature, presented in a manner consistent with the viewer""s taste level, for a product or service for which the viewer has an interest. The viewing of the viewer requested advertisement may also be advantageously associated with a compensation to the viewer for the viewing of the advertisement.
The compensation for the viewing of the advertisement may take the form of a credit that subsidizes the costs of other video services the viewer obtains. The subsidizing of a video""s cost to the viewer by advertisements, is more closely matched to the viewers interest in the subject of the commercial, and to the potential purchase by the viewer of that product or service.
Content-on-demand video services enhancements further provide for the automatic integration of the video and communication services delivered to a viewer. Specifically, during the viewing of a video, when a phone call, audio or audio/video, is received, the delivery of the video is automatically placed on hold (paused) in response to the viewer accepting the call. Upon completion of the call, the delivery of the video is automatically restarted at the point placed on hold, at some pre-defined amount of time prior to the placing on hold of the video, or at a suitable prior point in the video.
Where the video being delivered is a content-on-demand video, the video map identifies the beginning point of the segment in which the pause occurred, thus automatically identifying a suitable prior point in the video to restart the delivery of the video. By automatically replaying the segment in which the pause occurred, the viewer may re-engage the video without the loss of continuity.
Other integration features provide the display of information relating to the incoming call (data and image) on a window, without necessarily pausing the transmission of the video. On a pause of the video, the picture may be replaced with a blank screen, neutral image, or informational data. Where the communication is a video call, the screen image is replaced with that of the incoming call.
Where contact management software is available, the viewer is provided the opportunity to make such notations with respect to the call as may be required prior to the continuation of the delivery of the video.
These and other features, advantages, and objects of the present inventions, are apparent in the context of the detailed description of the inventions, accompanying drawings, and appended claims, that follows.